Today’s edition of quick hits:
* U.S. Navy SEAL Nicolas D. Checque was killed yesterday in a rescue mission of an American doctor who was kidnapped by the Taliban in Afghanistan. Checque, 28, was a decorated combat veteran and a member of SEAL Team Six. The doctor, Dilip Joseph, was returned to safety.
* Egypt: “A day after President Mohamed Morsi formally directed the military to help keep public order and authorized soldiers to arrest civilians, a spokesman on Monday sought to draw distinctions between the order and the forms of martial law that the Egyptian Army had previously imposed.”
* Najia Seddiqi gunned down: “A senior advocate for women in Afghanistan was shot dead by unknown gunmen Monday, officials said, the latest assassination of a women’s rights activist in the country.”
* A new Politico/George Washington University Battleground Poll shows 60% support raising taxes on income over $250,000 a year. The poll also found that “only 38% believe the Republicans’ argument that raising taxes on households earning more than $250,000 would hurt the economy, whereas 58% don’t buy it.”
* Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) will join the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, which as one of my colleagues noted, will probably mean even more Sunday show appearances.
* Despite the total absence of voter fraud in Alaska, Republican lawmakers in the state are poised to consider a new voter-ID law in 2013. * With the non-existent “war on Christmas” apparently not going well this year, Fox News is back to talking about the “Ground Zero Mosque,” which isn’t a mosque, isn’t at Ground Zero, and was a rather pathetic story when it grew stale over two years ago. * And Joe Strupp has an interesting report on what happened to the San Diego Union-Tribune, a once-respected daily, after it was bought a year ago by far-right financier Douglas Manchester. “People are so embarrassed by the [newspaper] that they are dropping their subscriptions,” said Don Bauder, who spent 30 years at the paper from 1973 to 2003, which included stints as financial editor and columnist. “Around town it is an embarrassment.” Anything to add? Consider this an open thread.
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